Why it works: Butter and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Puff Paste
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare the dough
Wash the butter in three or four waters and pat it dry.
Chill the butter and flour overnight.
In the morning, mix a piece of butter the size of an egg with the flour, then add ice water and the egg yolk.
Divide the remaining butter into eight parts.
Roll out the dough six times, spreading with one part of butter each time.
Chill the dough again before shaping into puffs or tarts.
Bake
Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).
After preparing the tarts, cool them on ice before baking.
For puffs, do not cool after adding the sauce, as they will soak.
Let the pastry set in the oven with the door wide open to help it rise.
Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.
Explore the science
The flavor team
The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.
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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together106,462 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together118,967 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Butter
- Forms the flaky layers, as it stays solid and separates the dough into sheets while baking.
- Flour
- Provides the structure that holds the layers together once baked.
- Egg yolk
- Adds richness and helps bind the dough.
- Ice water
- Keeps the dough cold and hydrates the flour to form a workable dough.
The step that matters
Keeping the dough cold between rolls. If the butter softens and melts into the dough, the layers blend instead of separating, so the pastry will not puff. Chilling between turns keeps the butter in distinct layers.
“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.
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